Norwalk seeks native enter on $100Okay tourism branding venture

NORWALK – The city is seeking local contributions at a $ 100,000 brand expense to attract more businesses and visitors to Norwalk.

Residents can fill out an anonymous form Online surveyIt’s open until March 26th and offers a choice of two different color schemes and three different logotypes for the city’s tourism website and marketing materials.

Prior to the development and tourism division, which was established in 2019, there was no branch in town designed to attract businesses and visitors to Norwalk, said business development and tourism director Sabrina Church.

“Nobody focused specifically on tourism,” Church said. “We thought it would be a good idea to band together to get people to visit Norwalk.”

To support the efforts, the city of Dornenburg hired Kallenbach Advertising from Bloomfield. A call for proposals was tabled to take on the marketing role and 13 responses were received, Church said.

As part of the branding campaign, Mayor Harry Rilling suggested that the city receive contributions from local residents.

“Nobody knows our community better than the people who live and work here,” said Rilling. “The survey only takes a few minutes and I encourage our residents and business owners to share their thoughts. Your opinions are important and will help us move forward. “

A committee of city officials and businesses, including a representative from the Maritime Aquarium, was set up to assist in the design decision, Church said.

“We wanted to do a holistic public relations work that has a certain influence. That’s why we show the public that we care what they think,” she said. “When we renamed the city, we didn’t involve the public as much as we did the staff. We wanted to go further this time around to make sure we got as much input as possible. “

The tourism website, visitnorwalk.org, Norwalk will contain attractions, restaurants, and accommodations. While the website is currently up and running, it is in its early stages and will be completed as the advertising campaign progresses, Church said.

“We wanted to create an asset that was free for businesses to self-promote,” she said.

Church and her team decided it was an opportune time to start the marketing campaign as COVID-19 restrictions ease and the spread of vaccines increases.

“There’s all this pent-up demand for people who travel and get out where they’re from and probably still drive for the most part,” Church said. “We’re doing the legwork to attract these visitors.”

The $ 100,000 Tourism Branding Project is funded by a Capital budget Request from the current fiscal year, she added.

Once the logo and color scheme is chosen later this month, work on the site will begin and is expected to take around a month.

“Hopefully when summer comes we will have a great tool that we can all use and be proud of,” said Church.

abigail.brone@hearstmediact.com